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I get a recurring error message at boot about 50% of the time...GENERIC HOST PROCESS FOR WIN 32 SERVICES ENCOUNTERED A PROBLEM AND NEEDED TO CLOSE. What does this process do? it seems the computer works fine anyway but i'd like to fix the problem. Any ideas?
Mark
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I'm not the person who originally posted with the Generic Host Process problem, but I've been having the same one. I found 7 .dmp files on my computer through a simple search from Start.
These Four are among the baddies that call themselves by that name although there are more than just these.
Svchost.exe is also called "Generic Host Process for Win32 Services" and you need at least a couple and maybe as many as 6 of them running for your PC to operate properly.
Generating the dump log for examination here is a good idea. Otherwise, you can easily figure out if the message is speaking of a legit process or one of the malware-spawned ones.
You don't say your OS version but if you have XP-pro, there is a utility, tasklist.exe, you can run from a cmd window to list all instances of svchost.exe you have running. If you run it and save the results, get the error, and run it again you can compare and if you have lost a svchost.exe session you have an OS issue and if not, you have a baddie.
If you have XP-home you will need to download tasklist.exe and put it in your windows or windows\system32 folder then do the following.
Click on start, on run, key in cmd and click OK.
Once you have a cmd window open, key in the following and press ENTER.
Code:
tasklist.exe /svc > c:\svchost.txt
which will place a text file in c:\ with details of each instance of svchost you have running. After you have the problem, run a similar command but with a double >> after the /svc so it will append the new report to the existing text file rather than overwriting it. You can either look for yourself or post the contents here for us to have a gander. The second command you run should be
Code:
tasklist.exe /svc >> c:\svchost.txt
If you need the tasklist utility, you can download it from Here (it's the 2nd item available for download).
Process Explorer will give similar information and generate a log file. It has the added advantage of saying who is listed as owner of the process which tasklist doesn't do but it lacks some of the detail. Free utility so may be something you want to get anyway.
Just stay with this thread to avoid confusion. It has background info we will need. If the original poster wants to talk about his system, I'll just split the thread so you have one all to yourself but with all the information in it.
I will have to delay my work on the Win32 Generic Host Process. I'm having some medical work done and I'm not sure when I will be able to work on it. Please forgive me. I will be back!
Speaking of "tasklist.exe" and svchost.exe I have just a simple question.
Can you not just copy Tasklist.exe from a computer with XP Pro and place it on a system with XP Home in the \system32 folder??
I'm just curious because the computers that I have, some have xp home and some with xp pro.
Sorry I wasn't clear. We have sorta started again in this thread. The other one vanished when I merged it with this one. Best this way since the original background information is all in here.
It's over now and I continue to have this problem.
